Barclaycard Premiership

Finding grace at St Mary's still a struggle for Saints

Southampton's worry is not so much keeping the home fires burning as kindling a spark at St Mary's stadium, where they have lost all three of their Premiership fixtures.

The Dell was a disgrace in terms of facilities. But visiting teams were frequently unsettled by its enclosed and hostile atmosphere, in which home supporters could not only convey their displeasure in a dark whisper but also pick the pockets of any player who had not left his valuables in the changing room.

For a perennially average Premiership side this was an important edge. Everyone is much more comfortable in their ocean liner of a new stadium, especially the away side.

Arsenal's last away league defeat was at The Dell in May and manager Arsène Wenger was well aware of the difference on Saturday.

"There was less pressure from the supporters," he said recalling, perhaps, his own side's faltering steps at Wembley's open acres when they played European matches there. Wenger, who rolls words around in his mouth like a man with a mouthful of her ring feeling for small bones -his English is not half as bad as he makes out - was probably also considering the coming move from Highbury.

"Away, Southampton have been winning regularly," he said. "But today you could feel their doubts and that the confidence was not there. You could see why they won at The Dell. There, they looked in control."

Southampton manager Stuart Gray observed: "The new stadium will bring in extra revenue because of the bigger capacity. But gone are the days when you take a throw-in and feel the crowd breathing down your neck."

Gray's concerns, however, are more fundamental than his home from home. On this showing Southampton will be arm-wrestling relegation for the rest of the season.

"This was a 2-0 drubbing," he conceded. "Against a team like Arsenal you can't give away an early goal and then go down to 10 men. But we need to strengthen the squad. The players we need have been identified. Now it's up to the chairman."

Gray was not the only pensive manager at the final whistle. Wenger knows Arsenal must do better than this to disconcert Panathinaikos in the Champions League at Highbury on Tuesday.

"We were not clinical enough," shrugged the shirt-sleeved Frenchman.

Thierry Henry, though he scored, had one of his more ornamental days. The fact that he missed the biggest sitter this side of the National Portrait Gallery was not intrinsically important; we already knew that this was no poacher.

This is an aesthete among footballers. He appears to place style ahead of substance. With six goals in eight Premiership games he can argue that there is substance too.

Some of his flicks and feints were pure exhibition stuff. But too often he failed to read the movement of those around him. There are times when he resembles a comic in search of a straight man.

Nor is it only in attack that Arsenal's problems reside. Their defence, even with Sol Campbell restored, was hesitant in the face of a meek probing. This was the first time since 1985 that Arsenal had fielded a side without any of David Seaman, Tony Adams, Martin Keown, Lee Dixon, Nigel Winterburn and Steve Bould. But this performance had supporters crying out for a few hoary hands.

Southampton looked like Gunner fodder from the kick-off. They went behind after five minutes with a goal from the eye-catching Robert Pires.

The match was over, as a contest, from that moment. Henry should have scored 16 minutes later, when he fluffed the easiest of chances. He did score, in the 74th minute, thanks to a benign deflection off substitute Stuart Ripley. It was such a scruffy, unpretty goal that Henry appeared reluctant to claim it.